By: Justin Stewart
Oakland can be a busy area during week day afternoons and weekends. While there are no shortage of restaurants, museums, college campuses, and shopping venues, there is only one comic book store: Phantom of the Attic.
Located on the 2nd floor of 411 South Craig Street, the comic book specialty chain has a series of stores around the greater Pittsburgh region. Since 1983, Phantom of the Attic has been a hub for college students and adults alike to indulge in their love for the genre.
The owner of the store is 60-year-old Jeff Yandora. Yandora grew up in Derry, Pennsylvania and went to college at the University of Pittsburgh, studying history and political science. Regarding his purchase of the store, he simply said “It just kind of fell [my] way and became available to purchase.”
Yandora didn’t originally plan on being a comic store owner, but once the opportunity came, he said that could not pass on it. What does an average work day look like for him? “I am happily working with customers, taking their comic orders, giving them comics that they put in order for, answering the phones, and doing some back issue work,” he said.
“I started reading comics in the 70s and I was drawn into them – Marvel Comics in particular,” he said. Yandora noted that he also liked the aesthetic from covers in the 1960s and 1970s, giving them that “retro look.” As far as what his favorite comic to read was, “The Fantastic Four. The first 100 issues done by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby is my desert island.”
The comic book store primarily specializes in selling newer additions of comic books. They also sell toys, novels, shirts, DVD collections, and so much more. New material gets shipped in every Wednesday at 1pm. Yandora jokingly noted that I caught him on a good day, as “Wednesdays tend to be our busiest day of the week,” he said.
The store was filled with a bunch of Spider-Man material, whether it be toys, comic books, or merchandise. Known for his relatability to non-superheroes, Spider-Man is considered to be one of the most popular characters in the comic book landscape.
As far as the most popular sellers at Phantom of the Attic, Yandora says that “X-Men still sell pretty well. Batman titles are always popular. Independent comics are popular [too]. There has even been a push lately for horror comics.”
These comics in the front of the store are the most valuable ones there, more expensive than the average cost of a comic on the shelf currently, which canrange from $5-10. Yandora said that there are drawers full of older comics and often adds to that collection, buying throwbacks editions.
